Chief Cornplanter Council
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The Chief Cornplanter Council, Boy Scouts of America is one of a few one-county Councils left in America. With the Council headquarters in Warren, Pennsylvania, this small Council serves roughly 1,000 youth members at any given time.
The Council has just one District named "Handsome Lake District" in honor of Chief Cornplanter's half-brother.
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[edit] History
In 1910, members of the community of Warren, Pennsylvania first explored Scouting activities. In 1913, the Boy Scouts of America gave a charter to an organization known at the time as the Warren County Council. In 1954 the Council's official name was changed to Chief Cornplanter Council to honor the famous Seneca Chief who had his home in this area in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Cornplanter, the son of a Dutch trader from Albany, NY named John O'Bail and a Seneca Squaw, was a prominent Seneca Chief during and after the Revolutionary War period. In the French and Indian War, he once fought against a British force under Braddock which included a young George Washington. Ironically, Cornplanter would later become a good friend of our Nation's first President as Chief Cornplanter dedicated the last fifty years of his life to preserving peaceful relations with our Nation.
[edit] Camping
The Council's Camp, Camp Olmsted is a nearly 500 acre property situated on the Allegheny Reservoir (not far from the Kinzua Dam), in the midst of the Allegheny National Forest in northeastern Warren County, PA. The Camp was purchased for the Council by George W. Olmsted. Mr. Olmsted organized the Long Island Lighting Company. Through some 50 purchases and mergers, the company grew rapidly in the next twenty years and eventually furnished electricity and gas to almost all of Long Island east of the New York City line. Mr. Olmsted had a deep love for the organization of the Boy Scouts of America and served as Chairman of the National Camping Committee of the BSA.
Camp Olmsted offers a 31 mile waterfront with water-skiing, motorboating, and sailing, in addition to the more traditional water activities of swimming, lifesaving, snorkeling, and BSA Lifeguard.
Camp Olmsted is located on land adjacent to the few remaining acres of the Cornplanter Grant, a parcel of over 600 acres given to Chief Cornplanter in 1791 by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Olmsted has been in continuous operation since 1923.
[edit] Order of the Arrow
The Chief Cornplanter Council's Order of the Arrow Lodge is Gyantwachia, first organized as part of the Warren County Council, Boy Scouts of America in 1944 as the Chief Cornplanter Lodge at Camp Olmsted. "Gyantwachia" means "one who plants corn," the Seneca name of Chief Cornplanter. The Lodge totem is the wolf.
